Many college football fans don’t realize that the football rivalry game played between the University of Missouri Tigers (Mizzou for short) and the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers for the Victory Bell Trophy is the second oldest rivalry within the Big 12 Conference. The University of Missouri and University of Kansas rivalry predates the Cornhuskers and Tigers rivalry by a year and five days. In addition to being the second oldest rivalry in its conference, this is actually the third oldest rivalry west of the Mississippi River, although most non-area football fans do not normally associate these two programs as rivals.

The Victory Bell is the name of the trophy awarded to the annual winner of this game. The idea for the bell trophy was stated by former University of Missouri athletic director Chester Brewer in 1926. The Victory Bell trophy is a traveling trophy, meaning the winning program keeps the trophy until it is completed. play again in the subsequent game that is held. the following season. The scores of every game since 1926 have been engraved on the Victory Bell.

The first meeting between these two programs that are 320 miles apart occurred on November 5, 1892. The game was played in Omaha, Nebraska (the University of Nebraska is based in Lincoln, NE) and was won by the Cornhuskers. The ongoing series has now reached a total of 103 games through 2009 and the Cornhuskers have a commanding lead over the Mizzou Tigers with a record in this rivalry game of 64-36-3.

For much of the series’ history, the overall standings were close. Through 1978, the University of Nebraska held a narrow lead by a margin of just five games before racking up wins during each of the next twenty-four contests. On October 11, 2003, in a home game in Columbia, MO, the Mizzou soccer program captured its first victory in this lopsided rivalry in 25 years. This particular upset came as the Cornhuskers entered the game ranked No. 10 in the country while the Missouri Tigers were unranked prior to the contest.

No wonder Missouri fans ran onto the field, goal posts were knocked over, and students celebrated late into the night. For just about every exuberant student on the Columbia campus, the October 2003 game was the Tigers’ first victory in this rivalry in their lives. Nearly five years later, on October 4, 2008, Mizzou would earn his first win at Lincoln, NE in 30 years. Prior to this win, the Tigers’ last win at Lincoln had occurred when NFL Hall of Famer Kellen Winslow Senior was playing for the Missouri Tigers. It had been so long that Kellen Winslow’s son (Kellen Winslow Junior) was already playing in the NFL.